Month-by-Month Spending by Foreign Tourists to the U.S. in 2013

Skift Take

Spend data on a granular month-by-month basis is valuable to local tourism marketers, but the overall trend — significant increases in annual spend — is an even more important signal that more money is on the way, no matter which month it’s spent in.

However, it’s not always this way. In 2012, tourists spent the most money in a single month in November. In 2011, it was July.

We asked the National Travel & Tourism Office for insights on why the best month for tourism receipts varies year to year, but it’s a metric that they don’t track.

“There are so many factors that influence a person’s decision to travel and their propensity to spend money that this isn’t something we track,” explains John Terpening, program manager for the international travel receipts and payments program.

There’s no exact correlation between visitation patterns and spending patterns.

The current data set does not distinguish between countries of origin of the visitors. The National Travel & Tourism Office will release data on exact visitation numbers for the second six months of 2013 by April.